A Study on the Socio-economic Characteristics of the Angler Population and the Estimation of A Fishing Frequency Function

유어낚시인구의 사회경제학적 특성과 출조빈도함수의 추정에 관한 연구

This article is to estimate the fishing frequency function in Korean recreational fishery with respect to socio-economic characteristics of anglers. First, the study described the characteristics of the entire angler population on the view points of 9 socio-economic variables. And then, the study divided the total angler population into three groups of in-land, sea, and mixed angler populations in order to investigate the differences in their characteristics. The study could confirm the existence of differences in regions, size of regions, and educational levels between the in - land and the sea angler populations by testing heterogeneity in the frequency table. The fishing frequency function is estimated using Poisson regression model in order to accomodate the count data(non-negative discrete random variable) aspects of the fishing frequency. However, the model specification error is found due to overdispersion of data. The model exhibits the lack of goodness of fit. The negative binomial regression model is adopted to cure the overdispersion of the data as an alternative estimation methodology. Finally, the study can confirm overdispersion does not exist in the model any more and the goodness of fit improved significantly to the reasonable level. The results of estimation of fishing frequency population modeled by the negative binomial regression models are following. The three variables of region, sex, and education have effects on the decision making process of fishing frequency in the case of in-land recreation fishery. On the other hand, the three variables of sex, age, and marriage status do the same job in the case of sea angler population. Among the left-over variables, both income and use of Internet variables now affect on the process in mixed angler population. Finally, the results of whole angler population show that all of the previous variables are proven to be statistically significant due to the summation of data with all three sub-groups of angler population.